To protect against Alzheimer’s disease, should we limit the intake of anxiolytics and sleeping pills? This is what a French study seems to indicate. The benzodiazepines contained in these psychotropic drugs would be dangerous for health. According to this study, 6,000 to 31,000 cases of Alzheimer’s are attributable to these benzodiazepine treatments, reveals the magazine Science and Futurewhich publishes the results in its October edition.
“This case is a real bomb,” worries Bernard Bégaud, head of the study in an interview with Sciences et avenir. The pharmacologist and epidemiologist at the University of Bordeaux, urges the health authorities to react. “On the one hand, our country makes a delirious consumption of benzodiazepines, on the other, we know that taking these treatments promotes entry into one of the worst diseases there is.”
To avoid making the situation worse, the pharmacologist recommends that doctors be made aware of the importance of not prescribing these treatments over a long period of time.
>> Read also our file on Alzheimer’s disease: signs, treatments and progress
